>You can find silly faults with individual examples all you want, but studies indicate that people have a tendency to think percentage-based about savings rather than absolute terms.
Which sounds like the smart way to go about it.
It seems a little illogical in the chocolate vs laptop $.50 off voucher, but it too makes sense. The laptop voucher provides almost no value to you, considering you are about to spent $700 dollars on the thing anyway. $.50 could be just the gas to go to the store to buy it.
$.50 for the chocolate on the other hand, will be taken only by cash strapped people (or coupon maniacs).
I doubt people with $700 at the ready to buy a laptop would at the same time clip a $.50 coupon for a chocolate bar.
The $.50 is $.50 regardless of what the voucher is for. It provides exactly $.50 no matter what. Sure, maybe someone with $700 at the ready for a laptop won't be the kind to be clipping $.50 coupons for anything but the same tendency to consider percentages rather than absolute values remains regardless of actual numbers. People will pat themselves on the back for saving $10 on a $50 garment but won't bother going out of their way to save $100 on a $20000 car.
>People will pat themselves on the back for saving $10 on a $50 garment but won't bother going out of their way to save $100 on a $20000 car.
Which also makes sense. $100,000 to me is serious money. To Bill Gates it's small change. Money is a relative - percentage thing.
A $20,000 car is a purchase you make once in 5-10 years. Saving $100 means nothing in that context --you're already parting with 200 times the amount, so if the $100 amount meant something for you, you'd have gone for a cheaper, say $15000, car in the first place...
Savings of $10 (20%) on small items, like food or garments, on the other hand, pile up.
You spend more than $20,000 on small items per year than you do on cars...
Which sounds like the smart way to go about it.
It seems a little illogical in the chocolate vs laptop $.50 off voucher, but it too makes sense. The laptop voucher provides almost no value to you, considering you are about to spent $700 dollars on the thing anyway. $.50 could be just the gas to go to the store to buy it.
$.50 for the chocolate on the other hand, will be taken only by cash strapped people (or coupon maniacs).
I doubt people with $700 at the ready to buy a laptop would at the same time clip a $.50 coupon for a chocolate bar.